Infographic: How Much it Would Cost for the Entire Planet to Switch to Renewable Energy

9 thoughts on “Infographic: How Much it Would Cost for the Entire Planet to Switch to Renewable Energy”

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  Anonymous December 31, 2015 at 6:13 pm

  What is the cost to convert (or create) all the vehicles, construction equipment, airplanes, harvesters, trains, etc to electric power? What is the cost to build all the infrastructure to charge all these machines with this vast amount of renewable energy? All these technologies need to store and transport energy, so what is the cost for building all of those batteries? Is there enough nickle in the world, literally to create that many batteries? Hydro is largely a done deal. Most of the big gets for that have already been done, so you can throw that one out. Geothermal energy at the the rate that you have used cannot be applied to a large scale, so you're true price is probably something in the order of $200 trillion. In current dollars 200 trillion is about 10 times what the world spent on WWII, so what you're proposing is about 50 years of the annual endeavor that WWII created in order to switch to renewable energy. Maybe we should re-evaluate, huh?

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  Anonymous December 13, 2013 at 12:00 pm

  I posted this once, don't see it, so will post again. Thank you so much for this study and these stats. They are the final puzzle pieces for my argument, to be published in January as Total Global Reparation, for a global shift to a green economy. I agree with Pedro that we can't really think of hydro as green, but at least you stay away from nuke. Thanks so much.

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  Anonymous December 13, 2013 at 6:44 am

  Please, lets not think of hydroeletric power is a clean energy. It flood thousands of forests or lands that are used to produce food. Sometimes the dams floos entire cities. There are huge impacts associated to this eletric generation.

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  Anonymous October 29, 2013 at 3:54 pm

  Hmm not a big fan of solar or wind just because they're unreliable, and wind turbines have been proven to be bad for the migration patterns of various birds. They're bad for the fauna environment. Dams rock, but why aren't we talking nuclear? And for the people who are worried about the by-products of fission, why isn't waste-less fusion being discussed? We're at the scientific level now where new molecular energy sources are a seriously sustainable possibility, if we can get over the cultural stigma and "superhero scifi" irrational fear of the n-word. (No, I don't mean the racial slur)

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  Dan Rezaiekhaligh September 26, 2013 at 9:03 am

  Biggest cost is replacing cars and infrastructure to charge the new EV's. And all industrial movers that would need to be replaced such as boats and trains and airplanes. There is also the problem with the shortage of materials for the construction of the renewables. Winds, Solar and ect. are a great start but they are still low on efficiency, just like our battery technology and power delivery and distribution.

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  jeeni zucchini September 25, 2013 at 7:17 pm

  This infographic fails to mention the option of 1st world citizens simplifying... using less.

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  Peerasak Chanchaiwittaya September 25, 2013 at 11:29 am

  Great, thnx^^

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  Edward Kerr September 25, 2013 at 10:13 am

  The other question that needs asking is: how much will it cost if we don't switch to all renewables? Considering that human (along will many other species) extinction is on the table, if we don't switch, I aver than any amount of funds expended to make the switch will be a bargain.

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  Gary Whitton September 24, 2013 at 6:24 pm

  Given there have been 5 magnitude 9 earthquakes in the last 100 years, I believe the bit about less than 10 in the last 1000 years, is probably way off.